In a move that’s sure to surprise lots of people who know how frustrated I get when I play difficult games, I’ve started playing Demon’s Souls (and you can hear more about that in this week’s show). If you’ve got any good pointers for me, feel free to share via the post comments, the episode’s forum thread, or the Geekbox contact form.

Don’t listen to what Ryan Higgins said about being totally screwed as a melee character, you’ll be fine playing as any character. You don’t have to limit your stat to the class type you chose in the beginning of the game. You can develop into any character and the game won’t penalize you for it. Higgen’s friend doesn’t seem to know how to play the game. If I understood the conversation correctly, his friend simply could not proceed in the game because was over-encumbered and could not move. Why didn’t he just drop the items that encumbered him o_O ?

There is a ring in level 1-1 (the very first level of the game) that lets you recover 25% of your health while in ghost form. And there’s another ring that increases your encumberancy by 50% (what I love about this game is that it significantly rewards you for exploring every nook and cranny).

There’s also a bow in the same level I believe (not sure though). Unlike pretty much every other RPGs in existence, bows are pretty important in this game. If you find the Tower Knight too hard, you can skip to the other worlds and play those first. But remember that certain enemies are weak to certain weapons, so bring those accordingly.

@Feanor Chill out man. It was just an anecdotal story — no need to come on here and harsh people’s mellows. Ray and Justin are really good friends, and I realize it’s easy to do off-hand comments on the internet, but I just had to log in here and say that your comment was, simply, fucked up. Just think for a second how you would feel if your close friend at work was laid off and then you read a comment like this from some thoughtless internet commenter. You’re entitled to your opinions, but have a little fucking common decency or consideration. GEEZUS.

For the tower knight keep out of attack range and run up for a few hits after he attacks, repeat until you hit both of his feet enough and he falls, then attack his head. If you need to heal just go to a blind spot.

In general each enemy has a predictable set of moves, lure an enemy to attack you, move back to keep out of attack range (with shield up just in case), then attack them with one or two hits and run away before the enemy starts to attack again. Repeat until dead.

It’s not super long like other RPG’s, it took me 40 hours to finish (following a guide) but I played as a magician class which makes things a lot easier. It’s also worth it to grind for loot to forge a good weapons.

Justin needs to quit telling the story of how he wouldn’t have let Ray give Demon’s Souls an A like Ray is some little bitch who would change his score just because his reviews editor is terrible at games that require actual thought and skill.

When you’re in spirit form you have half, which is a bummer, but keep in mind that you’ll rarely want to get touched by enemies at all in this game, so it becomes a moot point.

I completed the game almost entirely in spirit form, since you also avoid getting invaded by other players. Basically the game asks to reconsider what “death” means in games, sometimes it can work to your advantage.

The main thing though is just to simply take your time going through the stages, read the notes people leave and be cautious.